How-Tos, Home Tours and Designer Tips - Oh My!
Learn how to take your home from blah to bananas. We're dishing on all the ways to bring chic and unique style to your space.
Warning: Decorating with Chairish can be addictive.

Still on the hunt?

Whether you spend two hours or ten minutes in the kitchen, you want dinner to be served up right. Our suggestion? Add a vintage dining set to the menu. While we love a dining set, a used dining table allows one to get creative with the chairs. For a twist on things, mix a whitewashed farmhouse style with pop-colored industrial stools, or pair a traditional round table with streamlined, wishbone chairs. Don't know what dining table best fits you and your brood? Read about picking the perfect dining table here.

HOW TO PICK THE PERFECT VINTAGE DINING TABLE

The indisputable social hub of the home, a vintage dining table is so much more than a place to dine. With an expansive surface area that garners it a prime spot for homework and board games, not to mention a sense of durability that warrants it capable of handling even the messiest of art projects, a vintage dining table rightfully earns itself the title of the heart of the home.

With this said, it’s obvious that a vintage dining table is an investment piece, one with higher stakes than, say, a side table or accent chair. Not only does a vintage dining table need to fit your space and sense of style, but it also needs to accommodate your family at its loudest and proudest. To help, we’re outlining the basics of three common used dining table styles: the trestle, the pedestal, and the Parsons. To help decide on the best used dining table for your space, read on!

THE VINTAGE TRESTLE DINING TABLE

If you crave a used dining table fit for a feast, try a trestle dining table. Reduced to its most basic elements, a trestle table is composed of planks of wood set atop sawhorse bases that are supported by a horizontal beam. Chunky and often fantastically rustic, trestle tables are dramatic dining tables that dominate a room, infusing even the most modern spaces with decades-old character. Because of their size, try a vintage trestle table in a dining room that’s solely dedicated to dining, or a dining annex with a horizontal orientation.

When it comes to choosing seating to pair with your vintage trestle table, there’s something pitch-perfect about benches, which lend a relaxed, farm-like vibe. On the other end of the spectrum, trestles are also ripe for mixing with upholstered chairs or modern, sculptural ones. If none of these speak to you, but you still love the look of the trestle table, try a vintage trestle table that deviates from the usual rustic style, such as one in a glam glass and brass finish, or a concrete and iron finish.

One thing to keep in mind with these beauties, is that if your trestle bases sit on large feet, the feet may limit how many chairs you can comfortably fit around the table.

THE VINTAGE PEDESTAL DINING TABLE

Love dinner parties, but a tiny table has you frequently editing down guest lists? Then try a vintage pedestal dining table, which, quite enticingly, always has room to squeeze in one more! Fabulously functional, without any legs to get in the way, a pedestal dining table generally consists of a round table top placed atop a support column. The bases can range from simple metal tripods to an elaborate columns made of carved wood.

Which isn’t to say that a vintage pedestal table can’t be an inspired option for a small space. To turn a vintage pedestal dining tables into a small space dining table, opt for one with a relatively demure base, like an Eero Saarinen Tulip Table. Featuring a round, white marble top set atop a white, stem-like base, the vintage Tulip table is an elegant yet compact piece, perfect for tucking into breakfast nooks or bay window recesses that may have to suffice as dining rooms in space-challenged apartments. As a bonus, these tables often come with leaf extensions, making them pieces that can grow with you, if need be.

THE VINTAGE PARSONS DINING TABLE

If a trestle dining table seems too sizable for your space, and a pedestal dining table too showy, try a vintage Parsons dining table. Counted among our favorite designer dining tables, the Parsons table is composed of a flat slab top supported by square column legs of equal width. Modern and polished, Parsons tables are frequently finished in lacquer, but sometimes employ a faux finish like marble, stone, or brass. It’s also common to find them rendered in wood or metal.

When you consider the simplicity of the Parsons table, it becomes clear why makers have designed them in virtually every finish under the sun. Stylistically, it’s a vintage dining table that will easily merge with different styles of décor. Use a lacquered Parsons dining table in a modern dining room synced with sleek upholstered dining chairs, or use a wood Parsons dining table paired with simple wood benches.

Like a trestle table, Parsons tables typically showcase a horizontal orientation, making them best for dedicated dining spaces, but if you don’t have a lavish, sprawling floor plan, don’t count one out just yet! If you’re pinched on space, try using a Parsons dining table as a desk that can double as a dining table when you throw dinner parties.

QUICK TIP: VINTAGE DINING TABLE DECOR

Once you have your used dining table in place, the rush to serve up a maiden voyage meal can easily overshadow the an off-duty dining table can sometimes look very bare, indeed. Yet deciding what on vintage dining table décor can be difficult (what goes on must come off, after all). To simplify, try something simple like a runner anchored with a vase, trio of hurricane lanterns, or topiaries. If your look is more modern, skip the runner and try a single vase filled with fresh flowers.